Sablet et cie

Saturday morning up early and M and I went for a long walk around Paris.  The Luxembourg Gardens and the fourth, fifth and sixth arrondissements.  Very beautiful.  The weather was ominous and burst into a huge electrical storm as we sat down for a crepe.  Then back to the (very cute) Hotel Le Petit Paris to finish packing and taxi to Paris-Gare de Lyon to catch a train to Avignon. 

The train was great - very fast and efficient - less than 3 hours from Paris to Avignon.  Picked up our car without queuing (BMW 118D) and headed towards Sablet.  About a 40 min drive.  A few nervous minutes getting used to driving on the "wrong" side of the road, then it was totally fine. 

Sablet is a very very cute walled village of maybe a few hundred people.  It has existed for many hundreds of years and has - only in recent centuries - expanded beyond the ramparts.  Our little house is set into the ramparts, and the outer walls are multiple-metres-thick stone.  We are fairly safe from an arrow or cannonball attack, regardless of the ferocity.  It is two bedrooms and two bathrooms, with a kitchen a living room and a terraced garden set over 3 little floors.  Nicely fitted-out and well-restored from what was presumably a run-down shell not all that many years ago.

After arriving we settled in, then M and I went for a walk around the village - narrow cobblestoned streets, little houses set into stone walls, a few shops - very quiet and very beautiful.  Amazing views of the surrounding countryside at every turn.  Dinner at home (great to have a home-cooked meal after a couple of weeks of restaurant meals!).

Sunday morning we left H in Sablet and M and I drove to Lyon - about a 2 1/2 hour drive.  Stopped on the way in Rochegut, an almost supernaturally cute little town.  Everywhere I looked was worthy of (many) photos.  One of the prettiest places I have ever seen and a very sleeply little place.  Continued on to Lyon to meet M's old friend Emmanuelle and her family at the Botanical Gardens.  Finding the right gate and parking were incredibly stressful and we were very late.  Eventually found Emmanuelle and her husband and beautiful kids Jeanne and Louis.  Good to meet them and we had a really great picnic in the gardens and then played petanque with the kids.  Wandered around the park and the free zoo in the centre of the gardens (elephants, lions, tigers, monkeys - and more!). 
Headed home.  A long day - ended up being 6 1/2 + hours of driving.
Dinner in Sablet - a fairly average pizza place.

Monday M and I walked to Seguret, the next village.  A very beautiful village high on a hill.  The walk through vineyards was incredible - although we got totally lost and ended up retracing our steps and walking along the road.  A few kilometres each way.  Then M, H and I had fantastic breads from the local boulangerie for breakfast, relaxed, then headed back to Seguret for lunch at La Table du Comtat.  Amazing.  Well-priced, incredible food.  Ate the menu of the day - no choices, they simply bring you an entree, main and desert (plus a couple of tastes in-between).  Sat in the courtyard under a huge oak tree - a very relaxing way to spend a few hours.  The owner/waiter was emblematic of many of my encounters to date in France - he was so distressed by my attempts at French he appeared to by in physical pain. 
A short drive and a wander around Roiax, a small village.
A nap.

Tuesday we headed off to Avignon.  The home of the Popes for a period in the fourteenth (?) century and the proud owner of a fairly impressive papal palace.  Toured the palace - impressive but the experience was somehow uninvolving - then headed to Saint Benezet's Bridge.  Apparently there is a children's nursury rhyme about the bridge and M insisted on dancing around in a circle.
Drove H to Avignon TGV station for her train to Paris - the end of her holiday.  Waited with her for her train, then headed back into Avignon for a wander around.  Saw some very cute and interesting parts of the city, and stumbled on the old synagogue.  We went in and really enjoyed it - a beautiful, small circular room with many colums and quite unlike any other synagogue I've seen.
Eventually drove home to Sablet the (very) long way around.  We managed to get quite significantly lost on a relatively simply drive and it took us about 2 hours for a 40 minute trip.
Eventually arrived home and then headed out to dinner at Dolium in Beaumes de Venise.  Fantastic food - a tomato entree, followed by a really great duck dish and then a lime pannacotta-style desert.  The meal was enjoyed with great local wine (Gigondas AOC) then muscat, the local speciality, came with desert.

Today a long walk to Seguret via a different and even more spectacularly-beautiful walking path.  Then a breakfast comprising ever-more incredible breads from the local boulangerie.  Relax time.  This afternoon headed out to Vaison la Romaine (a town rich with Roman and medieval history and built on an incredibly steep hill.  Also with really good shopping).  Then drove to Carpentras.  Slightly run-down, but a fun place to sit in the main square drinking coffee and people-watching.  Headed back to Sablet, then an enjoyable dinner in Gigondas at Du Verre a l'Assiette.  The waiters again suffered through my French, mostly without complaint.  Gigondas is well-known for its wine and is another pretty little town.

The Cote du Rhone is proving to be incredibly beautiful, with great food and wine.  Who would have guessed?